Apparatus for manufacture of concrete buildings

ABSTRACT

Apparatus for the manufacture of buildings of reinforced concrete open on one side, in particular of prefabricated ferroconcrete garages, comprising an outer and inner mould each consisting of several parts and for use below floor or ground level, and having a frame with which the building is vertically movable, wherein the outer mould scaffolding by means of guide links and movable by drive means operative in the plane of the guide links.

Unite 1| Kesting States Patent [4 1 Aug. 1,1972

[54] APPARATUS FOR MANUFACTURE OF CONCRETE BUILDINGS [72] Inventor: Lorenz Kesting, 32' Amtsstrasse, 46

Dortmund-Wellinghofen, Germany [22] Filed: Oct. 22, 1969 211 App]. No.: 868,467

[] Foreign Application Priority Data Nov. 15, 1968 Germany. ..'.P 18 08 989.9

52 us. (:1. ..249/13, 25/130 B, 249/27, 249/162, 249/178 [51] 11 4. C1. ..B28b 7/22 [58] Field of Search ..25/120, 130 B, 131 Z, 1 B; 249/27, 13, 63, 66, 85, 152,161,162, 144, 170,178,180,184, 137

[56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,462,989 7/1923 Spelhouse ..249/ X 2,244,107 6/ 1941 Hayes ..249/ 180 2,717,436 9/1955 Tourneau ..249/162 2,894,311 7/1959 Sinclair; ..25/ X 2,903,777 9/1959 Mitchell ..-25/130 B 3,136,024 6/1964 Monica ..25/120 X 3,167,838 2/1965 Bergsten et al. ..25/120 X 3,274,306 9/1966 Kesting ..25/131 SD X 3,490,729 l/ 1970 Luce et al. ..249/ X 1,241,007 9/1917 Ogburn ..25/1 B 2,706,842 4/1955 Keffe'r' ..'..25/l3l SB 3,281,110 10/1966 Lister ..249/137 X 3,558,095 1/1971 McNielMl ..249/27 X 3,609,830 10/1971 Myklebost ..249/162 X FOREIGN PATENTS OR APPLICATIONS 674,658 1 H1963 Canada ..249/27 898,723 5/1945 France ..249/161 Primary Examiner-J. Spencer Overholser Assistant Examiner-B. D. Tobor Att0rney-Malcolm W, Fraser [5 7] ABSTRACT Apparatus for the manufacture of buildings of reinforced concrete open on one side, in particular of prefabricated ferroconcrete garages, comprising an outer and inner mould each consisting of several parts and for use below floor or ground level, and having a frame with which the building is vertically movable, wherein the outer mould scaffolding by means of guide links and movable by drive means operative in the plane of the guide links.

1 Claim, 7 Drawing Figures PATENTED B 1'97? sum 1 or 7 FIG. 7

IN VEN TOR PAIENTEDMIB 1 I972 3.680.824

' sum u 0F 7 7 FIG.4

80 IN VEN TOR @Qj. Z.

PATENTED B H91 3.680.824

SHEET 5 BF 7 FIGS {07%) /TIN Vi]: TOR

APPARATUS FOR MANUFACTURE OF CONCRETE BUILDINGS PRIOR ART Apparatus is known comprising outer and inner shells each consisting of several parts and arranged below floor level, and a frame with which the building is vertically movable.

Apparatus such as this is used for making buildings of this type in specially adapted factories. It must enable high production speed to be achieved and the measurements of the building to be kept as exact as possible.

The idea of manufacturing buildings of reinforced concrete in a mould below floor level has long been known. It has not however achieved practical significance because it was conceived in connection with field factories, which-are not suitable for moulds of the desired precision.

Hitherto, such monolithic spacious buildings of reinforced concrete, 1e.g., prefabricated ferroconcrete garages, ferroconcrete traffic control towers, ferroconcrete room cells for dwelling houses or the like, and other spacious concrete buildings, have been manufactured with the so-called mould trucks. The mould truck drives with the inner mould out of the building which has been formed and finished horizontally, as soon as the concrete has set. Manufacturing systems such as this are unreasonably expensive and are not much used because they require a relatively large amount of manual work and the building has to reach a very high degree of firmness before the mould is removed.

OBJECT OF THE INVENTION The state of the art does not yet include suggestions for removing the inner mould from the building before the concrete is entirely hard. Then the building can finish hardening on its own and the mould can be used again during this time.

The invention creates a device specially adapted for installing the whole mould statically, in order to mechani'ze the manufacturing process to a large extent.

BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION For this purpose the invention proposes that the outer mould should also be arranged below floor level and should consist of mould panels hinged to stationary mould scaffolds by means of guide rods and movable with tiering attachments which work in the plane of the guide rods.

FURTHER FEATURES OF THE INVENTION Further, in this apparatus the frame for the building is mounted below floor level on presses to release the attachment of the building to the inner mould, and can be raised by a lifting appliance arranged above floor level.

In particular the lifting appliance is to be constructed as a travelling crane. It is then appropriate to provide the frame with swivel devices for tipping the building round one side of the frame and setting it down on its base.

In such apparatus the inner shell can have mould panels which are movably mounted on the core of the mould for removing the mould from the building; ac-

cording to the invention the bearing of each movable mould panel consists .of pairs of guide rods, the mutual hinges of which are operated with a tiering attachment parallel to the mould panel plane and movable between mould panel and mould core.

It is also advantageous for the mould panels of the inner mould to have arranged on them rails which project into the inner core and are supported in the latter on rollers.

The advantage of apparatus such as this is that it is only necessary to operate the tiering attachments and lifting appliances in the prescribed sequence in order to carry out the installation and removal of the moulds with constant precision. Since the tiering attachments and lifting appliances can be specially constructed as hydraulic thrust piston drives, the process of installing and removing the moulds can be partly or fully mechanized. The building leaves the moulds when it has only slightly hardened, resting on the movable frame. In this way the apparatus according to the invention can achieve very high speed of production.

DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS A practical embodiment of the invention is now described with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which FIG. 1 shows a plan of an outer mould arranged below floor level in a factory, the mould parts being in the position which they occupy before removal of the moulded building;

FIG. 2 shows an elevation of the outer mould, the left hand side of which shows the position of the mould parts before removal of the building while the right hand side shows the positionof the parts after building removal;

FIG. 3 shows a section along the line III-III of FIG.

FIG. 4 shows an elevation of the inner mould with a mould core;

FIG. 5 shows a different elevation of the subject of FIG. 4, shown in a manner corresponding to FIG. 4;

FIG. 6 illustrates the inner mould in a view through the opening of the building; and

FIG. 7 is a diagram in two phases of the handling of the building after removal from the moulds.

The apparatus shown in the drawings is used to manufacture prefabricated ferroconcrete garages in a construction pit l situated in a factory below floor level. The pit accommodates all the parts shown in FIG. 1 to 6.

As shown in FIG. 6, the prefabricated ferroconcrete garage 2 is .a monolithic building having side walls 3 and 4, a roof 5 and a full length floor 6 which can have openings for the purpose of transport. One of the ends of the garage is open and in FIG. 6 is in front of the plane of the drawing, while the other end 7 is closed and is shown in FIG. 1.

The prefabricated ferroconcrete garage 2 has at its comers rib-like reinforcements l0, and is manufactured on a frame 12 in a corresponding inner and outer mould which will be described in more detail later. The frame 12 can, as shown in FIG. 7, be lifted out of the pit by a lifting appliance 13, using a harness 14, and has swivel bearings 15 for cooperating with fixed bearings 16 shown on the right hand side of FIG. 7.

As soon as the building has hardened sufficiently it can be removed from the moulds and it is then lifted out of the pit. The building fully hardens and can then be moved adjacent the fixed bearings 16 with the lifting appliance 13. The swivel bearings catch in the fixed bearings 16 so that the building is tipped round a quarter turn and set down on its floor 6.

FIG. 2 shows the frame 12 in its position in the construction pit. It rests on several hydraulic presses 17, which have, for example, a stroke height of 180 mm. Operation of these presses serves to raise the frame, and with it the building, in order to release its at tachment to the inner mould, before the building is lifted out of the pit with the lifting appliance 13 in the manner already described.

The presses l7 and the frame rest in the pit on a fixed substructure 18 consisting of several supports. On these supports are erected scaffolds 20 for each side of the prefabricated garage, i.e., for both side walls 3 and 4 and for the floor 6 and the roofS of the garage. The scaffolds are basically identical to each other so only one need be described in the following. On the supports 19 and 21 respectively of the substructure in the pit are erected vertical props 22 with l-profile which are braced with scaffold tubes 23, 24 and 25. On the side of the props facing the building are located at equal intervals brackets 26 which fit in the fork-shaped ends 27 of guide links 28. The construction of the guide links 28 is shown in detail in FIG. 3.

Accordingly, each guide link is constructed as a frame, the parts of which consist of tubes. Transverse tubes 29 carry the forks 27 at their ends and are connected to each other with longitudinal tubes 30.

Those ends of the forks 27 not facing the brackets 26 of the pipes 29 are mounted in brackets 26 which in their turn are secured on supports 31 resting on mould panels 32. The mould panels consist of a support construction 33 and the actual mould walls 34.

On the brackets a carrying the guides 28, which are at the lowest point in the pit, there are provided additional hinges 36 for attaching hydraulic thrust piston drives 37. These thrust piston drives are mounted at 38 on a bracket 39 of a support 40 belonging to the substructure.

When the thrust piston drives 37 are operated, as is shown in the right hand part of FIG. 2, the brackets 30 move around the radius corresponding to the length of the guides 28; at the same time the thrust piston drives 37 swivel round the points 38. This necessitates only small forces for mould separation and moreover the building is protected during its removal.

The movement of the mould panels is also guided by grid structures 41 and 42 which are arranged at the upper ends of the outer mould and which are secured to the pit.

The inner mould, shown in FIGS. 4 to 6, has a mould core consisting in its turn of a grid structure made up of supports of I-profile. The mould core also rests on a fixed frame 51, the frame 12 for the building being omitted from FIGS. 4 to 6.

Because of the special formation of the building, namely the convergence of the floor and the garage roof, the mould between floor and roof can be rigid. The mould panels 52 and 53 are therefore firmly fixed on the mould core 50. In this dimension the building can easily be raised from the inner mould.

The side walls 3 and 4 do not however converge. For this reason the mould panels 60 and 61 for these walls are movably mounted, as shown in particular in FIG. 5. The left hand part of FIG. 5 shows the mould panel 60 in its position when the mould is in place, while the right hand part shows the mould panel 61 during or after the process of mould separation. The movable mould panels 60 and 61 are moreover identically mounted, so only one of the bearings therefor need be described, as follows.

The bearing consists altogether of three guide rod arrangements 63, 64 and 65. Each guide rod arrangement has a pair of guide rods 66 and 67 respectively. The free ends of the guide rod pairs 66, 67 are hinged to the inner core at 68 and to the mould panel 60 at 69.

The mutual hinge 70 is connected with a tiering attachment 71 parallel to the plane of the mould panel 60 and movable between this mould panel and the mould core 50. The tiering attachment consists of two parallel supports 72 and 73, on which the guide rod pairs 63, 64 and 65 are arranged, and of traverses 74 and 75. The tiering attachment drive operates on the lower traverse 74 and is in the form of a hydraulic thrust piston drive 76 which is mounted to swivel on the traverse 74 at 77 and on the fixed frame 51 at 78. Operation of the thrust piston drive causes the guide rod pairs 66 and 67 to collapse, as shown on the right in FIG. 5, so that the mould panel 61 moves in the direction of the inner core.

To guide the mould panels 61 there are arranged, on the mould panels, rails 80, 81 and 82 which project into the inner core 50 and are supported in the latter on rollers 85 and 86, respectively.

By means of the apparatus described above, spacious buildings of ferroconcrete can be manufactured with constant measurements and in a relatively large quantity. All the processes of installation and removal of the moulds of the building are mechanized; they can therefore be made to a large extent automatic, i.e., programcontrolled.

I claim:

1. Apparatus for the manufacture of reinforced concrete buildings open on one side, in particular prefabricated ferroconcrete garages comprising:

inner and outer moulds intended for use in a pit below ground or floor level;

a frame upon which the building is moulded and against which the open front of the building rests, said frame establishing means by which the moulded building can be lifted from the moulds;

. the outer mould comprising mould panels;

a fixed mould scafiolding having a vertical part and a horizontal substructure beneath said frame for supporting same;

guide link means articulating the mould panels to the said vertical part of the mould scaffolding for moving said panels toward and away from said frame;

drive means operative in the plane of the guide link means to withdraw the mould panels from the moulded building;

presses between said horizontal substructure and said frame for the building for releasing the attachment of the building to the inner mould so that it can be raised by means of a lifting appliance;

a rigid rectangular mould core constituting the inner mould;

rigid mould panels on two opposite sides of said core;

6 sisting of pairs of guide links; mutual hinges for said links; and a tiering attachment movable parallel to the plane of the panels between said panels and the mould core for operating said hinges. 

1. Apparatus for the manufacture of reinforced concrete buildings open on one side, in particular prefabricated ferroconcrete garages comprising: inner and outer moulds intended for use in a pit below ground or floor level; a frame upon which the building is moulded and against which the open front of the building rests, said frame establishing means by which the moulded building can be lifted from the moulds; the outer mould comprising mould panels; a fixed mould scaffolding having a vertical part and a horizontal substructure beneath said frame for supporting same; guide link means articulating the mould panels to the said vertical part of the mould scaffolding for moving said panels toward and away from said frame; drive means operative in the plane of the guide link means to withdraw the mould panels from the moulded building; presses between said horizontal substructure and said frame for the building for releasing the attachment of the building to the inner mould so that it can be raised by means of a lifting appliance; a rigid rectangular mould core constituting the inner mould; rigid mould panels on two opposite sides of said core; said rigid mould panels tapering inwardly from bottom to top to enable separating the moulded building therefrom; mould panels on the other two sides of said core movably mounted for movement away from the moulded building; the bearing of each such movable mould panel consisting of pairs of guide links; mutual hinges for said links; and a tiering attachment movable parallel to the plane of the panels between said panels and the mould core for operating said hinges. 